Authentication for API usage

In order to use the Encyclopedia API service the user should authenticate first to get a token.

The endpoint https://encyclopedia-api.nomad-coe.eu/v1.0/saml is used to authenticate the user with the identity provider and to get acccess to a token. ALWAYS a web browser should be used to access the mentioned URL. The user will be redirected to IdP service provider where the login take place. If the user doesn’t have an account yet, a new one can be created there, as well. After the user authentication with the IdP server is succesfull, the browser will redirect to https://encyclopedia-api.nomad-coe.eu/v1.0/saml/user/ where a few user details, including the access token can be found.

Below there are a few screenshots which will guide you to the authentication process:

Type the following URL in your browser:

https://encyclopedia-api.nomad-coe.eu/v1.0/saml

Here is the initial login window where the user can introduce their credentials, use a guest account or register for a new user account if you don’t have one (for this tutorial you can just use the guest account):

login

The IdP server will store some information about the user and here the user should agree:

information release

After clicking “Accept” the new token is generated and send it to the user:

token\_api

The generated token will also have an expiration time embedded in it, it will expire after 24 hours, so, a new token (new user login/authentication) should be requested after this period of time.

After the user is authenticated with the IdP server and the token is received, the token can be used to send requests to Encyclopedia API.

Before starting the tutorial, here is some information about how to logout from our services:

logout confirmation
  • after the logout is confirmed the user is logged out from NOMAD services:
logout confirmed

After everybody knows how to login, get a new token and logout, here is a new link wich will be really useful during our tutorial:

Encyclopedia API Specifications/Documentation is available here: https://encyclopedia-doc.nomad-coe.eu/

The Encyclopedia API URL which we will use in our requests is https://encyclopedia-api.nomad-coe.eu/v1.0/